[Advaita-l] Vikalpa, Savikalpa, and Nirvikalpa

[V Subrahmanian]

On Wed, Oct 10, 2012 at 8:22 PM, Vidyasankar Sundaresan <
svidyasankar at hotmail.com> wrote:

> . In my opinion, by doing so,
> you also risk misunderstanding and misrepresenting advaita vedAnta. You
> will miss
>  the core of what is said about dhyAna in the yogasUtra-s and bhAshya, as
> also how
> this core is very, very close in spirit and practice to what a serious
> vedAntin needs
> to incorporate in his or her personal nididhyAsana.
>

In the book 'gItAshAstrArtha viveka' Shri SSS has made a fine case for the
common points between the Patanjali yoga and the nididhyAsana/dhyana that
is taught/described/prescribed in the Gita 6th chapter.  He admits that
there is 'chitta vRtti nirodhaH' in the Gita, the same way as it is in the
patanjali system. As the phala of the nirodha, there is the 'draShTRu
svarUpe avasthaanam' in Vedanta too as also specified in the yoga shAstra.
The only difference is in the meaning of the drashTA.  There is samAdhi in
the Gita even as there is in the patanjali system.

It should also be noted that even for the patanjali dhyana, the input comes
from the shAstra, for there is the 'svAdhyAya' element in the 'niyama'
stage itself there.

regards
subrahmanian.v


>
> It is all well and good to read and/or produce text after text and think
> that it is all part
> of "niScayena dhyAtavyaH". Beyond a point, all that is just vAg vaikharI.
> The risk is that
> it will become a mega SAstra vAsanA, as is being discussed in another
> current thread.
> SAstra is absolutely important, but a serious jijnAsu has to realize, at
> some point of
> time, that he or she has to act on the advice given in SAstra, rather than
> talking about
> SAstra. One needs to concentrate on "om ity evaM dhyAyatha AtmAnam" and
> "anyA
> vAco vimuncatha". Once this is started, all these doubts about where
> pAtanjala yoga
> and advaita vedAnta stand with respect to each other will start vanishing.
>
> Best regards,
> Vidyasankar
>
> _______________________________________________
> Archives: http://lists.advaita-vedanta.org/archives/advaita-l/
> http://blog.gmane.org/gmane.culture.religion.advaita
>
> To unsubscribe or change your options:
> http://lists.advaita-vedanta.org/cgi-bin/listinfo/advaita-l
>
> For assistance, contact:
> listmaster at advaita-vedanta.org
>